Shane Williams column: Senior men must take the blame at Ospreys

Ospreys held on for a good win at Newport Gwent Dragons on Friday night but it looks too little too late to save them from possibly their worst ever season. Only twice in 12 years have they finished out of the top five and never lower than seventh. Now both are looking a distinct possibility.
That is unacceptable for a team that have been Pro12 champions four times and head coach Steve Tandy knows it.
I was part of the same Ospreys team as Steve the last time they finished down in seventh place in the league, in 2007/8, but we reached a Heineken Cup quarter-final and won the Anglo-Welsh Cup. This time there is no such excuse.
They were desperately unlucky not to reach the last eight of the Champions Cup and only missed out on the final day of the pool stage. But at the end of the season, Ospreys are not only looking like they will finish empty-handed but not even qualify for the Champions Cup.
It already looks bad to see them down at the wrong end of the table with the Italians sides but it would be pretty humiliating for the Ospreys to no longer be playing among Europe’s top tier.
Yes they have had injuries to the likes of Rhys Webb and now Alun Wyn Jones and Justin Tipuric, but so do all teams.
And yes they suffer from a lot of international call-ups, but again, so do other teams. It’s not like the days when Wales had 13 Ospreys in the starting team.
Scarlets have suffered badly with injuries but are in the top four.
Perhaps the difference is that Scarlets coach Wayne Pivac pretty much wrote-off Europe for another year and concentrated on getting his team into the Pro12 play-offs and it looks like the plan is going to work.
However, there are positive signs for Ospreys in terms of young players coming through. In fact pretty much the only good thing to come out of this season is the unearthing of more young players such as Adam Beard, Keelan Giles and Tom Phillips.
Lloyd Ashley has really emerged this season, Owe Watkin looks like the could be a really strong player and Sam Underhill proved again on Friday night with a man-of-the-match display against the Dragons that he could be one of the finds of the season.
I wouldn’t be surprised if Eddie Jones caps him with either England or England Saxons this summer.
The simple fact is that the senior players haven’t performed as well as they could have. They had a poor start to the season and have been playing catch up since, failing to win games they should have and losing far too many at home.
None of this will sit well with Tandy and he knows this is a results business.
I think Steve has done a great job since taking over in early 2012 and he shocked a lot of people by leading Ospreys to the title in his first season in charge (my last game for the club). He knows the players and the region inside out and he also knows the job is never safe.
But there are a lot of changes going on right now throughout the club, starting from the top with a new management structure following the departure of chief executive Andrew Hore.
Everything is going to be looked at both on and off the field, including the academy, the players and the coaching.
Tandy will not be happy with the way the season has gone but neither will the players and ultimately they are the ones who have to look at themselves.
As for the Dragons, it was yet another case of so near but yet so far. They’ve lost a staggering amount of games by less than seven points but they simply have to learn to turn those into wins. Narrow losses can’t be acceptable next season.